Dear John
by H.J. Bender
Summary: John Rider betrays his family, his country, and his partner...but only one of them ever betrays him back. JohnxHelen, JohnxYassen, YassenxAlex.
1. Oxford

He could still remember their Oxford days, when she was all smiles and eyelashes and blushes, when she was his girl and he was her guy and the rose-colored tint of their lives hadn't yet begun to fade. He could still remember holding her hand under the desk in the library that night, nineteen if they were a day, their heads together and their whispers warm as they cast shadows over books about western politics and anatomy. He could still remember the first time he kissed her, how soft her lips were, how brightly her smile shone, the promising murmur of her tender "good night". He knew then, in some part of his soul, that he would never love another girl as much as he loved Helen Beckett.

Even during his military years she remained his girl, his sweetheart. She'd visit him on base as often as she could, he'd see her during furloughs and holiday leaves, and the time in between the occasional rendezvous only magnified their attraction to one another. They were so very much in love, so very happy, and the years tiptoed past them in the dark without making a sound. Before they knew it, John was MI6's most promising new agent and Helen was a registered nurse and Oxford was almost ten years behind them. How quickly time passed under love's enchanted skies.

John grew more skilled at his job, the assignments increased in distance, depth, and danger, and soon Helen was routinely spending her evenings with a paperback novel and a cup of tea. She went to bed earlier, went to bed alone, and never failed to wake up in the same condition. She missed him, his smell and his weight at her back, the sound of him breathing, his big rough hands holding her small smooth ones. Her man. He would always be her man, even if he left her tomorrow and never looked back.

MI6 had a tendency of driving spades between hearts, to separate the inseparable. While Helen was fighting loneliness at home, John was fighting terrorists in Libya. While Helen struggled to find a path in her life, John struggled to find a path through jungles and warzones. Correspondence was discouraged, meetings prohibited. Helen began to wonder who John Rider really was, what he was becoming, whatever had happened to the young man who'd held her hand under the library desk at Oxford University in 1976.

John was well aware of his situation with Helen. The expanding divide, the passing time. He didn't want to lose her, to give up the best thing that had ever happened to him, but he didn't want to stop fighting the good fight, either. This was what he was meant to do, who he was meant to be, and if he couldn't figure out a way to do both then he just wasn't trying hard enough.

Helen's heart stopped when John got down on his knee in 1983, hope in his eyes and tears on his cheek, and asked if she wouldn't mind changing her name a little. Fear and love and joy had rushed in and jolted her back to life, and she'd cried tears of happiness for the first time in over a year.

They were married the following week in an impromptu ceremony at the London registry office. It was as far from a romantic wedding as one could get, but their adoration for each other more than made up for whatever was lacking in traditional ceremony. Not that it would have mattered anyway—they were blind with love and saw only each other.

They hadn't been married two years when John went deep undercover. He hadn't wanted to accept the mission—a year, maybe longer—but Alan Blunt had succeeded in convincing him that only a man of John Rider's skill and resourcefulness would be able to pull off this stratagem. And it was a _huge_ stratagem; SCORPIA had emerged as one of the most powerful, well-connected crime organizations in the world, and only the best of the best would be able to pass as one of their own.

Saying goodbye to Helen at the airport was one of the most difficult things John has ever done. For the first month the separation was terrible, the second month awful, the third month bad. By the fourth month he had numbed himself to the pain conjured at Helen's memory and begun to focus on his duties as a SCORPIA operative.

He was instructing a course in weapons and tactical defense when the "talent scouts" introduced a new student into his class, a slim, redheaded teenager who looked much younger than his nineteen years. John read his file and learned that his name was Yassen Gregorovich, former employee of the Izmaylovskaya Gruppirovka (Russian mafia—Moscow district), good with handguns, lots of potential, nothing to lose. Yassen had come to SCORPIA in the form of a tip, along with 300 Kalashnikov assault rifles and 150 M1911 pistols.

At first John didn't know what to make of his new trainee. Gregorovich was a good pupil, quiet, hard-working, diligent. He began tutoring him in English and French and he responded well to the additional course material. John pushed him harder, challenged him with books and conversation, made him recite Shakespeare during hand-to-hand combat exercises. He was certain the kid would completely despise him after three months, but Yassen flourished under the tutelage and basked in his instructor's attention. It was hardly a surprise when SCORPIA partnered the two of them on their first mission to the Amazon. They worked well together, trusted each other, had a very cohesive relationship. SCORPIA expressed the greatest confidence in their abilities.

John didn't realize it then, but his old life had begun to vanish in the shadow of his new one. As the image of Helen's smile slowly disappeared from his thoughts, the chiseled lips and long eyelashes of a Russian teenager had already begun to take her place.


	2. Malagosto

In hindsight it was worse that the worst bad idea, sneaking back to England every few months just to see her for a day, but there was no way this marriage was going to work if John didn't break the rules. Helen was already becoming detached, the sparkle in her eyes dimming, the creases deepening on her forehead from too many worries. She looked tired, weary, as if the fountain of all joy in her life had been staunched to a weak trickle. She seemed happy enough when she was with him, but neither of them could pretend that they hadn't changed, that they were just another happy couple, that somewhere along the way they hadn't lost whatever had burned between them in the past. He could tell by her gaze that he had become a stranger to her—his girl, his sweetheart—and that hurt him more than any blade or bullet. He felt compelled to make this work, to make her happy, but he couldn't do that if he wasn't there. And he always had to leave.

So he'd tell her white lies, make her happy for a few hours, make her believe that the flickering flame of love's goodness would be enough to stave off the cold winter gales. But in the end he'd leave, like he always did, and the scabby rifts between them were ripped open afresh and blood gushed in the wake of his footsteps.

Helen would cry herself to sleep for nights afterward. She wasn't an overly-emotional person, not with her rational personality and fondness of reason, but we all go to the same dark place when our hearts are broken. Helen dwelled in that dark place, shackled to John's ghost by a golden chain, waiting for his return. Always loyal, ever faithful—such a _good_ little wife—even as the best years of her life slipped away from her forever.

Finally she knew she couldn't do this anymore. It was killing her, and she wasn't ready or willing to give up her life so soon. So she drank her morning tea and rolled her wedding ring round her finger and made a promise to herself. Next time. The last time.

* * *

It was killing John, too, but there wasn't anything he could do about it. He was alone at Malagosto, his life hanging on his ability to play a convincing part, his every breath borrowed from Death's greedy clutches. Perhaps that was why he found himself molding a companion out of Yassen Gregorovich, if for no other reason than to keep himself from being sucked down into the mire of his own solitude; for at no moment did John come closer to being genuinely happy than when he was in the presence of his bright young protégé.

Yassen didn't mind at all—if anything he relished the intimate camaraderie of SCORPIA's most valuable agent. He liked John. John wasn't like the other instructors at Malagosto, all scowls and scars and ego. John smiled, laughed, made awful jokes that were only funny because of their awfulness. John cared about Yassen, was kind to him, never punished him without sound reason, always thought of Yassen's best interests. He was witty, strong, talented, intelligent, an all-round fantastic man. If it wasn't hero worship, it had to be love, but Yassen wouldn't know. In his twenty years he'd never had a hero, nor had he ever been in love. All that had changed when he'd met John, his hero, his mentor.

And as of February 1986, his lover.

* * *

It had been five months since the last time he'd seen Helen. It was even more dangerous now, but it was a risk he was willing to take—and he had to take it. He was obligated as a man, committed as a husband. But nothing could have prepared him for this.

"John, I'm pregnant."

And just like that, the entire course of his life had been changed by three little words.

His first thought, perhaps fueled by the guilt of his own affair, had been _it can't be mine_. But then he'd seen how big her belly was, he'd done the math, and with a sinking feeling knew that the child was probably his. No, it _was_ his—Helen wasn't an adulteress. Helen was a good woman. She had waited for him. She loved him loyally and unwaveringly. She was his girl, his sweetheart. And now she was going to be the mother of his child.

It was with that epiphany that a torrent of pure elation, adrenaline, and wild, hysteric love exploded through John's body and reawakened feelings he thought had died in him years ago. He'd laughed, he'd smiled, he'd taken Helen's small smooth hand in his large rough one and kissed it and cried, "That's wonderful!"

But Helen's face gazed back at him emptily, streaked with the salty tracks of old tears, and she told him that when she'd found out she'd called the doctor and scheduled a preliminary appointment. For an abortion.

When she saw the horrified look on John's face then, she burst into tears. "But I couldn't," she sobbed, "not without telling you first. I thought you should know."

And in practically the same breath she told John she was leaving him, she couldn't raise this child without a father, it deserved a father, it deserved a life free from assassins and violence and terrorists, and God, _God_, she was so scared, what was she going to _do_?

And right then, John Rider decided to give up being a spy and become a husband and a father. He took Helen in his arms and hugged her and kissed her and held her in a way that meant he was never letting go again. "We'll make this work," he told her. "I'll find a way. Trust me, Helen. We'll make it work."

And Helen, with the round bulge of their baby pressed between them, had believed him with all her heart.


	3. Home

There had been no right way to do this. He was leaving behind a mess and everyone in MI6 knew it. But at least they didn't know about the mistake—the biggest, stupidest mistake that any agent could make and John Rider _had_ made—waiting for him on Malagosto. And now he was going back to fuck things up even more, because lying to the people who trusted him was something he'd grown sick of.

Yassen had listened to John's confession without saying a word. John had expected anger, violence, disgust, _some_thing, _any_thing. But Yassen just sat on the edge of the bed with shiny eyes and a straight face as John told him about his career, his wife, his baby boy back home in England. The silence had been harder to deal with than any outburst or attack. John knew he'd hurt Yassen deeper than he'd ever been hurt before, and not even the whitest of white lies could have mended the tattered shreds of his heart. Even a single tear would have been a blessing, but Yassen refused to give him that much.

John had been crushed, but he knew his sorrow was only a fraction of the pain he'd inflicted upon his partner. He hadn't meant to hurt Yassen, hadn't meant to get this involved, but God, Helen and Alex _needed_ him now and John wanted to be there for them more than anything. He wanted to be a good husband and a good father, and there was no way he could be either of those if he was sleeping with the enemy.

"Am I your enemy, John?" Yassen asked him outright.

"No," John answered, shaking his head and pulling Yassen into his arms. "You're not. You'll never be."

And then the good husband and father had kissed the 21-year-old Russian and lain him down on the pillows and made love to him as if nothing else existed in the world. No condom, no cares. Just one last brokenhearted tryst in a two-year history of trysts.

It was the worst way to say goodbye. John had never been very good at them.

* * *

Of course John hadn't wanted him anymore. He had a baby, a life, a home, and nowhere did a rangy redhead from SCORPIA fit into that nice little slice of family pie. But despite how badly he'd been wounded and how much he resented John for doing this to him, there was no way Yassen would ever betray John the way John had betrayed him. He'd die before selling him out. Rider was his friend, his mentor, his man. He always would be, even though he was leaving for good and Yassen would never see him again. Who was he to deny John the right to a happy, normal life? He deserved it. Little _mafiya_ brats who grew up trading sex for safety didn't.

He wished he'd been more selfish. It might have saved John's life if he'd gotten angry and screamed and cursed, but Yassen had rationalized and made excuses and looked the other way, and then the Riders had been blown to pieces over France a few weeks later.

Yassen was devastated. Even though he knew John was out of his life from the moment he'd been "captured" in Malta, there was gentle reassurance in knowing that somewhere on the other side of the world he was still alive and happy. But now Yassen didn't even have that. John was gone, and Yassen didn't dare mourn him for fear of giving himself away. So he swallowed his tears, hardened his scarred heart, and hoped that the passage of time would free him from John's memory.

* * *

But some ghosts are never laid to rest. Fourteen years later in Cornwall, John came back and dangled a glass tube of modified smallpox virus in front of Yassen's face and dared him to shoot. Yassen didn't know what had scared him more—this boy who was the spitting image of his dead partner, or the possibility of spending the last hours of his life writhing in mortal agony.

He'd let the boy escape, almost let him ruin the entire operation, but the incident with Sayle had given Yassen an excuse to punish the man who dared to point a gun at John Rider's son. Though it was immensely satisfying to take out that contemptuous bastard, Yassen hardly expected Alex to thank him for it. Apparently he'd killed the boy's uncle without realizing it, and that hadn't exactly won him any favors. Yassen hadn't meant to turn Alex against him, but it was probably for the best. He'd already wreaked enough havoc on the Rider family; Alex didn't need to get involved with his dad's old flame.

But he did. He kept coming back, getting in the way, meddling, spying, asking questions. It was wrong. John wouldn't have wanted this to happen to his son. He'd died so that Alex wouldn't be subjected to this cutthroat world of espionage, and now he was following right in John's footsteps. Yassen wanted to tell Alex the truth about his father. He wanted to grab the boy and slap him and shake him, scare him so badly that he'd run away from MI6 and never look back . . . But when Alex stood defiantly before him, it was like John was there again. Same courage, same strength, same smile.

Same taste.

Yassen had no right. He knew he didn't. But he couldn't help himself. The answers to Alex's questions had come at a price, but it was a price the boy was willing to pay. While Alex paid with his body, Yassen paid with his conscience. The knife that John had eased gently into his back fourteen years ago had been pulled out, and now Yassen used it to stab the ghost who'd broken his heart.

As he lay in a bed in Saint Petersburg with this beautiful teenager asleep on his shoulder, Yassen finally felt as if he and John were even.


End file.
